title: Effects of personal and universal helplessness upon self-esteem.
abstract: To test effects of personal and universal helplessness on self-esteem, three groups of experimental subjects completed a self-esteem questionnaire, worked on unsolvable anagrams, completed a posttest self-esteem questionnaire, and estimated their success on an angle-matching task. Subjects in a 10% failure group were led to believe they failed all anagrams, while 9 other subjects succeeded. Subjects in a 50% failure condition were led to believe they failed all anagrams while 50% of the subjects succeeded. Subjects in a 100% failure condition believed they, and 9 other subjects, failed all anagrams. Control group subjects were not exposed to failure. A 2 x 4 (sex x condition) analysis of variance, with difference between pretest and posttest self-esteem scores as the dependent variable, showed a significant main effect for success/failure conditions and sex of subject, and a significant interaction. On the angle-matching task significant main effects for success/failure and sex were observed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Washington State University, Pullman 99164-4820.
authors.forename: J P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Murphey
authors.forename: G G
authors.initials: GG
authors.lastname: Galbraith
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006380:Helplessness, Learned; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D010553:Personality Development; D011340:Problem Solving; D012649:Self Concept; D012931:Social Environment